


Experiments of Tone

by angelplates (pelinal)



Category: Team Fortress 2
Genre: Other, dodgy Scots, dodgy music theory, this is very quickly becoming my ''embarrassing nonsense'' pseud
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-16 16:33:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28585026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pelinal/pseuds/angelplates
Summary: Tavish is different. He transforms that dumpy little piano every time he sits down—he walks it through a ritual, cleaning it of coffee rings and dry pink dribbles of gum. Swiping the dust from the lid with his sleeve. And he'll play a few scales, not to warm up, but just as a handshake.Hello piano. Here we are again.
Relationships: Demoman/Reader
Comments: 4
Kudos: 27





	Experiments of Tone

There's an ugly little upright piano in the corner of the common room. It doesn't belong to Tavish—his name's not on it—but he _is_ the only one who ever touches it. Spy has a glossy black concert wing to himself, and no one else plays. Well—Scout likes to play that chopsticks song. But by now, your entire team will pelt him with shoes, books, beer bottles, couch cushions, TV guides, oil rags, bladed weapons, and whatever else happens to be lying around, before he can get within ten feet of the damn thing. Fucking chopsticks. Spy has offered to teach him something—anything—different, but Scout's not in it to learn, just to provoke.

Tavish is different. He transforms that dumpy little piano every time he sits down—he walks it through a ritual, cleaning it of coffee rings and dry pink dribbles of gum. Swiping the dust from the lid with his sleeve. And he'll play a few scales, not to warm up, but just as a handshake. _Hello piano. Here we are again._

You've watched him do all this. Not often; usually Soldier will have the radio blaring, or Scout will be glued to the TV, and no one will be in the mood for music. Or they'll shout requests. Sniper will want something ragtime; Medic argues for Moonlight Sonata. And Tavish will play both, and then, grumbling, stand up and go into the kitchen to wash a few dishes before they pile up.

But every now and again, the common room is quiet, the others are scattered around the base, and Tavish puts the piano through its paces in peace.

The first time you're alone with him, and he sits down to play, your ears prick up—you're dying to know what he'll choose when he's not being needled by your teammates.

You have no idea what the hell you're hearing. You suppose it must be modern. There's no discernible melody, or there _is,_ but it never quite goes where you want it to. It's pretty in places, haunting even—but mostly it's kind of hard to listen to.

But you lean discreetly across the arm-rest of the sofa to catch a glimpse of his face, and your breath snags. He has this—uncanny focus, his eye is narrowed, his lips are just barely parted. You see him startle when he misses a note, and then his satisfied smile when he finds the right one. You see the care in his hands, how deliberate his touch on each key. He makes this plain little hunk of oak feel fifty times more precious than Spy's fancy concert piano.

When he's finished, and he gently closes the lid, you scramble to look natural. You bury your face in the same page of the same magazine you've been skimming for the last hour. After a moment, you glance over the top of your page, and Tavish throws you a smile that makes your heart jump. You clear your throat and go back to 'reading'.

The second time you're alone with him in an empty common room, and you see him make for the piano, you blurt, "heycaniwatch?"

He gives you a baffled grin. "Why don't ye take a breath an' give that another go?"

"Can—sorry. Can I watch you play? If that doesn't bother you."

"Ah." He shrugs. "Don't see why no'."

You grab a chair and sidle up to the piano, and watch him firsthand, polishing the filth from the top with a spare rag he fished out of the sink, gathering a gray wisp of dust, before he lifts the oaken lid. He cracks his knuckles and plays a few absent-minded scales. Then he turns to you. "D'ye play anything yourself?"

"Nothing at all," you say.

"But ye'd like tae?"

"I'm not very musical. I like watching other people play." You bite your lip. "I don't have a mind for it."

"It's maths," Tavish says, looking you in the eye. "That Spy'll preach to ye about the emotions an'—an' the feelings of it, but he's a ponce. It's jus' maths, plain an' simple. Look." He plays a scale, counting each note, up to eight. "One. Eight." He plays the notes together. "Tha's an octave. One and five—" he plays the two notes together. "Fifth. One, and three, and five—" He plays three notes. "Tha's a chord."

You blink. "Right."

He laughs. "Come sit with me."

"With—" You gesture at the piano stool.

"Aye, come on." Tavish shifts to make room for you. "'s big enough for two."

"OK," you say, abandoning the chair you've dragged out from the dinner table and sitting beside him. He was right—there's room for two, but just barely. His shoulder, pressed against yours, is warm.

"All right?" he asks, taking your hand in his. You nod. He positions your first three fingers on the keys—you're a little stiff, he struggles to put them all in the right place. "Play that."

You do. It sounds pleasant. "Is that a chord?" you ask.

"Aye. Sounds lively, eh?"

"Yeah. I guess so."

"An' if you. . ." He takes your index finger and moves it from a white key to a black one. "Play it now?"

You do, and you frown when you hear the result. "It's different. It sounds like a funeral."

"Tones reactin' in different ways. Now, did ye feel a great stirrin' of anguish in yer heart, or did ye jus' move yer bloody finger?" He plays the same sad chord. "One, three, five. It's only maths."

You copy the chord again. One, three, five. It makes an odd kind of sense. "So you're not a fan of emotional music."

Tavish scoffs and plays the first bit of that Moonlight Sonata Medic likes so much. "Listen how bleedin' hard it's tryin' tae be tragic." He whimpers along with the melody, making fun of it. You laugh.

"Some people like to find meaning in the stuff they listen to," you point out. "Even if it is a little. . .dramatic."

"An' I've no problem wae that. But tha's the job o' the bloke listening, no' the bloke playing."

"Fair enough," you say. "So what do you like?"

"Number problems," he grins, and plays the same piece as last time. Or maybe it's different. You can't tell. But the same sort of strange, unsatisfying abstract music. It still doesn't sit right with you, but you watch his face again, watch how hard he thinks about every note, how his eye closes halfway and his dark eyelashes catch the sun.

After that, you sit in every time he plays. Sometimes he talks about numbers—sometimes he asks you what you like, and why, and pieces it apart with you, like a math problem, down to the last note. He invites you onto the piano stool with him and presses keys, and you copy him, and you both jostle one another here and there. You get used to the warmth of him beside you. Once, without thinking, you rest your head on his shoulder, and he freezes for a moment—then he leans into you just the same and goes right on playing.

"Reckon ye'll like this," he says on a scorching Sunday morning, when the others are in town or holed up in their rooms to escape the breathless heat.

You lift your head, the damp fabric of the sofa slowly unsticks itself from your cheek. "What?" you murmur.

Tavish grins and turns back. He plays a short bit, nothing at all like his usual style. A few low, sentimental notes together—chords, you suppose—and then a few high notes like chimes.

You pull yourself upright, tugging on the front of your button-up with one hand to air it out. "That's different."

"Come here, then, an' let me show ye." He plays it again as you walk over. Low chords, and then high notes. Despite the heat, you're happy to plunk yourself beside him on the stool. "It's a simperin' bloody song about a bloke who throws himself off a mountain to be wi' his love."

"You hate it," you note. "So why play it?"

" _Because,_ " he says, taking your clammy hand in his clammy hand, "it proves my point. Here. A major."

"Sure," you say, letting him place your fingers.

"And then A major an' a sixth." He counts the keys. "One, three, five, six."

"Six." You play the chord.

"Hear that?" Tavish plays the same chord, the A major and then the sixth. "Reaching up. Can't quite get where it's goin'. Eh?" He plays it again, stressing that reaching note. "Tension. 's all maths."

You grin, watching the gears turn in his head. "And then?"

He shows you another chord, and then adds the sixth again. "Reach, reach, reach—but no' quite."

"Play me the next bit," you say impatiently. You want to get to his point. "The _pling, pling, pling_."

"Ah," says Tavish, and gives you a fat wink—it has to be a fat wink, or you wouldn't be able to tell. "A major again." The first high chime. "Third inversion, second inversion, first inversion, third again, all the way down."

". . .Sure," you say again.

He plays the low chords with their sixths. "Reaching—" Then he plays the high notes. "—and fallin' down the mountain. Leavin' it go."

"Oh." You frown, determined to understand. "Do it again?" He does. You hear the reaching man in the low chords, trying to touch a lover who is too far away. Then you hear the high notes falling gently down the expanse of the piano, like the man flinging himself off the cliff. "I hear it," you say.

"Sentimental tosser that wrote this," grumbles Tavish. "I play it an' I've got bile risin' in the back of my throat, but a man wae a heart hears it an' swoons. It's no' about emotions. It's numbers. _Tha's_ my point."

"I like it," you say defiantly.

"Thought ye might."

"But I've seen guys fall from high places. It's not all that whimsical." You grin. "Do it again, the _pling._ "

He does. This time, when all the chiming high notes have finished their magical fairytale descent, you strike the lowest key on the piano as hard as you can, like the ugly thud of a meaty body hitting the ground. Tavish bursts into laughter—his deep, chesty laugh, that makes your heart sing.

"Much better," he says, and throws an arm around your shoulders.

**Author's Note:**

> i had this headcanon that demo—like, this vast scientific mind that he has also influences his approach to music, therefore he has an affinity for more abstract pieces that have kind of a mathematical bent (what i specifically had in mind was Jakob van Domselaer's "Proeven van Stijlkunst")


End file.
